201,191 research outputs found
The people of no religion: the demographics of secularisation in the English-speaking world since c.1900
This article argues for study of the decline of religion in western countries, not merely
in terms of loss and negative consequences for (predominantly) Christianity, but in positive terms for the individuals who have taken the decision to forsake organised religion.
It puts forward the need to consider ways of examining secularisation which grant respect
to categories of secularity selected by respondents. After contextualising an examination
of the category of ›no religion‹ (also known as ›none‹) from state censuses and surveys,
the article compares the growth in the numbers of people adopting these labels in Canada,
Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, the United States and the four countries of the United
Kingdom (England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland). This shows ultra-low levels
prior to 1960, followed by a common pattern of rapid change in the late 1960s; however
the rates of change, and the destiny of the change, differ thereafter. The article concludes
by examining demographic information as to who ›no-religionists‹ were in terms of age,
gender and race, and explores some economic and religious-heritage determinants of
growth. It posits a key linkage between feminism and ›no-religionism‹, but acknowledges
the need for a vast increase in research
The utility of knowledge
Recent epistemology has introduced a new criterion of adequacy for analyses of knowledge: such an analysis, to be adequate, must be compatible with the common view that knowledge is better than true belief. One account which is widely thought to fail this test is reliabilism, according to which, roughly, knowledge is true belief formed by reliable process. Reliabilism fails, so the argument goes, because of the "swamping problem". In brief, provided a belief is true, we do not care whether or not it was formed by a reliable process. The value of reliability is "swamped" by the value of truth: truth combined with reliability is no better than truth alone. This paper approaches these issues from the perspective of decision theory. It argues that the "swamping effect" involves a sort of information-sensitivity that is well modelled decision-theoretically. It then employs this modelling to investigate a strategy, proposed by Goldman and Olsson, for saving reliabilism from the swamp, the so-called "conditional probability solution". It concludes that the strategy is only partially successful
Beam Loss Control for the Fermilab Main Injector
From 2005 through 2012, the Fermilab Main Injector provided intense beams of
120 GeV protons to produce neutrino beams and antiprotons. Hardware
improvements in conjunction with improved diagnostics allowed the system to
reach sustained operation at 400 kW beam power. Losses were at or near the 8
GeV injection energy where 95% beam transmission results in about 1.5 kW of
beam loss. By minimizing and localizing loss, residual radiation levels fell
while beam power was doubled. Lost beam was directed to either the collimation
system or to the beam abort. Critical apertures were increased while improved
instrumentation allowed optimal use of available apertures. We will summarize
the impact of various loss control tools and the status and trends in residual
radiation in the Main Injector.Comment: 5 p
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Can UT Austin Play a Role in Cuba's Academic Future? And Vice Versa?
Latin American Studie
Determining the Cost of an IPM Scouting Program
A simple model of an integrated pest management (IPM) program is presented. The model incorporates most common sources of income and expenditure encountered by scouting programs. It has been validated in the 30-county Kentucky IPM program using county- specific parameters and agrees very well with current pricing policies in those counties. This indicates that it should be a reliable indicator of future policies as labor and fuel costs rise. Other applications of the model are discussed
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Smile asymmetries and reputation as reliable indicators of likelihood to cooperate: An evolutionary analysis
Cooperating with individuals whose altruism is not motivated by genuine prosocial emotions could have been costly in ancestral division of labour partnerships. How do humans ‘know’ whether or not an individual has the prosocial emotions committing future cooperation? Frank (1988) has hypothesized two pathways for altruist-detection: (a) facial expressions of emotions signalling character; and (b) gossip regarding the target individual’s reputation. Detecting non-verbal cues signalling commitment to cooperate may be one way to avoid the costs of exploitation. Spontaneous smiles while cooperating may be reliable index cues because of the physiological constraints controlling the neural pathways mediating involuntary emotional expressions. Specifically, it is hypothesized that individuals whose help is mediated by a genuine sympathy will express involuntary smiles (which are observably different from posed smiles). To investigate this idea, 38 participants played dictator games (i.e. a unilateral resource allocation task) against cartoon faces with a benevolent emotional expression (i.e. concern furrows and smile). The faces were presented with information regarding reputation (e.g. descriptions of an altruistic character vs. a non-altruistic character). Half of the sample played against icons with symmetrical smiles (representing a spontaneous smile) while the other half played against asymmetrically smiling icons (representing a posed smile). Icons described as having altruistic motives received more resources than icons described as self-interested helpers. Faces with symmetrical smiles received more resources than faces with asymmetrical smiles. These results suggest that reputation and smile asymmetry influence the likelihood of cooperation and thus may be reliable cues to altruism. These cues may allow for altruists to garner more resources in division of labour situations
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